|
|||
|
|||
|
 |
|
|
SOUTHEASTERN CONFERENCE WOMEN'S TOURNAMENTMarch 5, 2014Matt InsellKenyotta JenkinsValencia McFarlandDULUTH, GEORGIA Ole Miss – 63 THE MODERATOR: We'll start with an opening statement from coach. COACH INSELL: What a great win for our basketball program and for our kids. I told our kids we're playing as good as any team, we have to keep fighting till the final buzzer. As you saw tonight, this team did not give up. Had plenty of chances to give up when things weren't going our way. They kept fighting and kept fighting. I got so much respect for our players. I'm proud of them. We're going to enjoy this tonight. We beat a very good Arkansas basketball team and found a way to win at the end. THE MODERATOR: Valencia? VALENCIA McFARLAND: First of all, I'd just like to thank God. That was an amazing comeback. When we got down, we never gave up. We just fought till the very end and were able to pull off the win. THE MODERATOR: Kenyotta. KENYOTTA JENKINS: I want to thank God. Coach always talks about having toughness and fight. The whole game we showed our toughness and we fought and we won. THE MODERATOR: Questions. Q. Take me through the last offensive possession. KENYOTTA JENKINS: Well, we missed a shot. Arkansas got the rebound. In the huddle coach drew up a play. If they miss, somehow we have to get a stop. When the shot went up, Diara got it going out of bounds, when I saw it there was still time on the clock and I thought, Thank God. Put it up on the perimeter and it was going in. VALENCIA McFARLAND: It was basically just a toughness play from both Diara and Kenyotta. For Diara to get the rebound and for Kenyotta to be able to finish the play and put it back in. It was a great play altogether. Q. The play before that one, they had fouls to give, but you managed to get the recovery on the inbound play. Describe what went on in that series of possessions. VALENCIA McFARLAND: Basically we was trying to get a stop, trying to foul. Hopefully they would miss at the free‑throw line. Somehow they turned the ball over and it just fell in our favor. COACH INSELL: We do this drill every day that's kind of a score‑stop, score‑stop. We talked about that in the huddle, to see where we're at, if we can do that. Score, get another stop, score, get another stop. We got that and it just continued on. That's all I kept on telling them, Stop, score, stop, score. We finished the game on a 14‑2 run. It's amazing how this team just continues to work hard every single day. We do not worry about our record. But they work hard every single day to keep fighting till the final buzzer. We worked on that drill a lot. They got tired of me working on that drill half the time in practice. Tonight it came through for us. I'm proud of them for that. Q. Kenyotta, extending your career one more game, what does that mean? KENYOTTA JENKINS: It just means we get to keep playing. I told the team before we went out that I'm not ready to go home. We wasn't. So we fought till the game. We not going home. VALENCIA McFARLAND: Basically what Kenyotta said. We weren't ready to go home yet. We want to continue playing. We're not done yet. Q. Coach, when you came to Ole Miss, you were taking on a rebuilding project. COACH INSELL: Remodeling. Q. Talk about how much a win like this means for you in terms of motivating and inspiring your players but also recruiting. COACH INSELL: This is a huge win. Ole Miss basketball, that's why I say 'remodeling,' it's one of the most storied programs in women's college basketball. I didn't look at it as rebuilding, I looked at it as a process of getting us back to the top. A win like this helps you get there. You beat Auburn on Sunday, you come back beat Arkansas on Wednesday. Every time you get a chance to take the floor and you continue to work hard, we're not only working hard for ourselves and our teammates, we're working hard for the alumni. We had several of them here today. Made me proud in to get a win in front of Peggy, Carol, Jennifer was here also. That's what paved the way for all of us to be here. We're working hard every single day to live up to their expectations. Where they want this program to be. We're going to get there. We're going to get there. We talked about, before we came into this tournament, Georgia's men that did it several years ago at the Georgia Dome where they played four games in four days and won the tournament. We talked about Connecticut's men, they played five games in five days and won all five of them, all of them were close. We came to this tournament playing to win it. We came here to play to win it. That's what you come to the tournament before. We know we've been close all year. The first step of our process to get our program back to where it was. We're competitive. We're tired of being competitive, we want to win some games. Q. What did you think of Tia's game tonight? COACH INSELL: She's an all conference player. She's one of those explosive players in this league. She battled all night. She had to play 39 minutes coming off of a concussion. If the doctors would have allowed her, she would have played Sunday. She's a warrior. 8‑10 from the field. I'm proud of her. When you look at that, she was 1‑15 at Arkansas. She did not play well at Arkansas. She struggled. She knew she struggled. She wanted to come in here and show Arkansas that she wouldn't go 1‑14. She did it, 8‑10. Battled all night long. I'm proud of Tia. I'm proud of all these girls. I'm proud of my whole team. THE MODERATOR: Thank you. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
|
||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
About ASAP Sports •
FastScripts Archive •
Recent Interviews •
Captioning •
Upcoming Events •
Contact Us
FastScripts | Events Covered | Our Clients | Other Services | ASAP in the News | Site Map | Job Opportunities | Links |
|
ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297
|